


Station Lights

by doublelead



Category: THE iDOLM@STER: SideM
Genre: Break Up, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-09-13 06:45:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16887597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doublelead/pseuds/doublelead
Summary: Maybe it’s the pansies in full bloom, weaved in-between tall stalks of heathers into a bouquet cradled in Rui’s arms when he turns. His voice is unfairly light. Unrecognisable, in a way, much too measured than what Hokuto is used to.He watches a stray petal drift down, laughs, quiet, as purple brushes against the top of Rui’s shoes and down on to the floor.“You know,” Hokuto breathes, perhaps a little self-loathing. “I’ve always liked you best when you smile.”





	Station Lights

He’s too far out – a part of Tokyo he has no business being anywhere near, the station tiles under his feet unfamiliar, off-putting. Hokuto’s apartment is around an hour away in the opposite direction, without a direct train line from where he is right now.

“I didn’t think I’d ever see that kind of look on your face, Michael.”

A part of him wonders why he had chosen to do this in the first place.

“I’m surprised you expected anything different.”

Maybe it’s the pansies in full bloom, weaved in-between tall stalks of heathers into a bouquet cradled in Rui’s arms when he turns. His voice is unfairly light. Unrecognisable, in a way, much too measured than what Hokuto is used to.

He watches a stray petal drift down, laughs, quiet, as purple brushes against the top of Rui’s shoes and down on to the floor.

“You know,” Hokuto breathes, perhaps a little self-loathing. “I’ve always liked you best when you smile.”

Every part of him struggles to stay still. Each step of a passenger from the platform, tapping off at the ticket gates, continuing on towards their walk home, makes him realise how out of place he increasingly feels.

He shouldn’t be here. He questions every single decision that had lead him here, when just about anything else would have been easier.

“Do you think you have the right to say that right now?”

The flowers framing Rui’s smile is almost too cruel of a joke. He bites back the thought to ask, if Rui, or the rest of the tennis circle members who had given him the bouquet, knew what they represent. ‘ _Loneliness,’_ and _‘_ _Please think of me,’_ couldn’t have been more ill-fitting. Both as parting gift, and for what Hokuto refused to see, as a reflection of Rui himself.

“I truly am sorry,” he says instead. It’s nowhere near enough, but also, at the same time, everything that he could manage.

“I’ve heard you’ve been signed under an idol contract?” Rui is well within his own rights, to have chosen not to answer him. He looks up to the fluorescent lights above them, toys with a bruised petal between his fingers.

Hokuto hears the eleven-forty-one train depart, through the rumbling under his shoes, the cold rush of air playing at the strands of their hair. They’re an hour past, two transfers and nine stops after. Numabukuro is quiet by comparison, a small local station in Nakano, to the bustle and thrum of their university graduation in Yotsuya.

This is where Rui is going to be from now on.

This is where Rui had found his place, without him.

_And Hokuto―_

“ _Oh―_ Um, _yeah,”_ he swallows the hitch in his throat, the urge to look away. “I didnt think I could tell you, with everything that’s going on.”

―Hokuto has nine minutes before he has to go back to Nerima.

“Congratulations, really!” Rui laughs, a semblance of familiarity Hokuto doesn’t think he deserves – especially not right now. “I can’t wait to brag to all my students that I know Ijuuin Hokuto.”

“I wouldn’t be allowed to give out autographs, you know?” Still, he plays along. Tilting his head, his grin comes out resigned, lopsided.

“ _Haha_ _,_ you shouldn’t have to worry! They probably won’t believe me anyway.” Rui’s voice grows quieter as he moves, finally, searching his pocket for his IC card. Palpable weight laces his breath the moment he turns, away from where Hokuto could see his face, “But yeah, I’ll let you go.”

“See you then, Maita-senpai,” Hokuto says, soft, more so than he had intended.

It’s the station lights that separates them this time. The glow from the ticket gates tints Rui’s fingertips, the tassels of his scarf blue. There’s a crease in his brows when he smiles, crinkles around the corner of his eyes, red staining his cheeks.

“Believe it or not, that’s probably the one thing I don’t think I can forgive you for.” Rui says, in the end.

 

**Author's Note:**

> _"To think you would talk about someone like that, Hokuto. Did you change?”_
> 
>  
> 
> From Ep.9 where I interpreted it as Hokuto couldn't give Rui commitment, back when they first dated in their time at university together. They get back together at some point in the course of the anime timeline, but someone else needs to write that for me LOL


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